Icebreakers & Influenza
by fleurofthecourt
Summary: Nick & Neal and Peter & Monroe, through coincidence and misadventure, end up spending the better part of a stay in Rhinebeck, New York in each other's company.


Rubbing his hand down his face in consternation, Peter stared at the hotel's empty front desk. For whatever reason, his phone wouldn't pick up WIFI, so he was now attempting to find directions the old fashioned way. Evidently the universe was against this, which stood to reason. It was how his day was going.

He and Neal had not been planning on staying in a hotel upstate, but the elements had had other ideas. What had started as a few light flurries that afternoon had become a wintry mix of sleet and snow that he wasn't particularly keen on driving through.

They were stuck here at least until tomorrow.

Of course, Peter had a feeling it would be longer, though, not because of the dangers inherent in driving down snow and ice covered state routes but rather because of Neal's less than stellar immune system.

Despite the fact that Peter knew Neal had gotten a flu shot because he'd been with him when he had, he was pretty sure Neal had the flu. It would have been nice if Neal had told him he thought he was coming down with something before they'd driven three hours upstate to authenticate an art collection that could have just as easily been authenticated next week, but, well, it was too late for that now.

In any case, the very thought of spending the next day driving across ice sheeted pavement while Neal continued to fiddle endlessly with the heater, turning it on and off as his fever demanded, made Peter's temple ache. So he'd gotten Neal settled in the hotel room before heading out to find a few things he thought they'd both need for the next day or two.

He had thought that, in addition to telling him where the nearest open drug store was, the folks at the desk could offer him, at the very least, a toothbrush. But, after a few minutes of staring and a shout asking if anyone was there, Peter was coming to the conclusion that the front desk was a lost cause.

As he started to head for the front door, a semi-familiar looking man wearing plaid pajama bottoms, a yellow coat, and a worn down expression that mirrored Peter's own approached the counter.

"I think we're neighbors," Peter said waving his keycard.

"Uh...maybe?" The guy said, warily giving Peter a once over, clearly uncertain why Peter was talking to him.

"I don't think the hotel staff is around. Anything I could help with?" Peter asked, trying his best to demonstrate he was just being neighborly.

The guy seemed to weigh the pros and the cons of letting a complete stranger help him as he ran his fingers through his curly brown locks. Apparently the pros won. "My ...uh...the guy that's staying here with me, he has the flu, well, I think it's the flu, and I'm not really from around here..."

"So you need to find a pharmacy that's still open?" Peter asked. The guy nodded. "So do I."

Then with a soft laugh, he added, "My partner's sick too."

"Maybe staying here wasn't the best idea," The guy huffed.

"It's flu season. Anyone that didn't get a shot is vulnerable no matter where they are. Well, since we're in the same boat, would you like some company searching downtown Rhinebeck?" Peter asked.

The somewhat wary look returned, and Peter swore the guy sniffed at the air before nodding. "Okay, yeah."

"I'm Peter, by the way," Peter said, offering his hand.

"Monroe," The guy said, taking it. Peter grinned at the steady but calloused grip.

xxx

As the door rattled, Nick burrowed deeper into the covers and pulled his pillow over his ears. He assumed, because it had already happened once - between helping him up to the room and getting their suitcases - that Monroe was having trouble with the door. Eventually, he'd get it open.

However, as the door rattled a third time, Nick heard, despite the pillow, an unfamiliar voice muttering softly, "I'm not going to break into my own room."

Afterwards, with slightly more volume, a distinctly raspy voice said, "Peter, if you're back, can you let me in."

Realizing that this guy wasn't going to go away without some kind of intervention, Nick groggily pulled himself off the bed. He stood up, swayed slightly as his knees buckled beneath him, and finally wrapped his arm around the bedpost until he felt like he could make it across the room.

He hesitated before pulling his gun out of the drawer he'd had Monroe, who had raised his eyebrows heavily but said nothing, stick it in. He had a feeling that the guy was just drunkenly attempting to get into the wrong room, but well, he could be violent about it. Or worse, he could be violent and Wesen. Nick didn't imagine he'd take kindly to a Grimm telling him he had the wrong room.

Nick, regretting that Monroe, hoping he wouldn't hear as much from the hall, had had him take the bed closer to the window, slowly made it to the door. As he reached to unlatch it, it swung open. He just barely stepped back in enough time to avoid being hit.

"Peter? You're condoning breaking and entering now? ...You're not Peter," The guy said as he caught sight of Nick poised defensively, gun in hand. He took a step back, dropped the bottle of orange juice he was holding, and raised his hands in surrender.

Nick lowered his gun. The guy lowered his hands.

"This isn't your room," Nick said, wincing at his own voice. He cleared his throat before continuing. "Check your key. It should have the room number on it."

The guy blinked dazedly before looking down at his key. He started to move back into the hallway before leaning heavily against the doorframe. "Sorry, I need a minute."

The guy closed his eyes, and Nick thought that really didn't seem like a bad idea. Except that he was still holding a gun, and this stranger was still lurking outside his hotel room.

Deciding he didn't need it, making sure the safety was on, he dropped the gun and kicked it back towards the bed. Then, blearily, he held onto the door trying his best to keep his own eyes open. He wasn't actually sure he could, but the guy didn't really seem like a threat, and, if nothing else, he figured, Monroe couldn't be gone much longer.

Although he didn't actually remember doing so, he must have fallen asleep. It couldn't have been for long though, he knew, since what woke him up was the weight of the stranger falling on top of him and the subsequent sound of the door slamming shut behind him.

"Well, if you're going to sleep on top of me, can you at least tell me your name?" Nick said as he gently shook the guy's shoulder. Mostly because his fever clouded mind didn't have the energy to argue, he'd formed a "if you can't beat them join them" mentality about the situation. Besides, they had both just fallen on the floor. It was hard not to feel a little empathetic. "Mine's Nick."

He paused, then added, "Sorry I pulled my gun on you."

"Neal," The stranger said, rubbing at his temple. "And, really, I didn't mean to intrude. My fever must be higher than I thought."

"Fever," Nick said, nodding to himself. "You have the flu too."

"Too?" Neal said. Nick kept nodding.

xxx

Nick was not a sound sleeper, Neal discovered quickly.

He didn't imagine that Nick's plan had actually been for both of them to end up in his partner's bed, but that was, nonetheless, what had happened.

Despite the fact that he was relatively certain neither of them could stand for long, at least not without assistance, Nick had managed to navigate them into the bathroom, then insisted they both drink something - that's why you had the orange juice, isn't it? - and grabbed two dampened washcloths along the way.

Then deciding neither of them were up to expending the energy on going back into the hall, he'd told Neal that he could stay in Monroe's bed until Monroe came back.

Once Nick had helped Neal onto the bed, he'd sort of half passed out lying against , figuring he was about to end up back on the floor, tugged him up with a gesture of invitation, which Nick had gratefully accepted.

After that, they'd both dozed off.

Unfortunately, Nick's elbow jabbing into Neal's ribs had done little for his ability to stay asleep.

He edged away from Nick, partially to avoid being hit again, before turning to watch him somewhat anxiously. He was thrashing violently against the sheets and breathing heavily.

Neal tentatively raised his hand over Nick's shoulder. He thought dazedly that you weren't supposed to wake someone up from a nightmare, but Nick looked distraught, and Neal sort of liked being on the bed.

"Nick," Neal whispered as he gently shook his shoulder. "Wake up."

"Monroe?" Nick said hopefully as he blinked awake, helplessly disoriented. Sleeping in a strange room with a strange man should do that to you, Neal suspected, his own heightened experience in the matter notwithstanding.

"Not Monroe," Neal said, frowning; based on Nick's limited description, which had made Monroe sound like a bearded version of Peter tall, brown hair, brown eyes, scruffy beard, a little socially awkward , he knew he looked nothing like the other man.

Fortunately, Nick's eyes lit with comprehension, but the accompanying crestfallen expression led Neal to add, "Sorry."

Nick looked as though he were about to comment but was instead taken over by a coughing fit.

Neal waited until he seemed like he was done to ask, "Was it about Monroe?"

Nick frowned. "Yeah. It was. It was vivid...he..."

Nick trailed off, looking, if it were possible, more drawn.

Neal didn't prompt. He had a feeling if Nick wanted to tell him what had happened, he would. He barely knew the guy, so he didn't think pressing the issue was the best course of action.

However, despite this, since they had become hapless companions of circumstance, he started to rub his hand soothingly down Nick's shoulder. The fact that Nick's skin felt as warm as his didn't might have also been an incentive.

"I know it wasn't real," Nick said after a minute. He directed it at Neal, but Neal suspected it was more of a self-reassurance.

"Call him," Neal said.

Nick raised his eyes. Neal rolled his.

"I know you know it was a dream, but you still need to know he's okay," Neal said. "You aren't going to be able to sleep if you don't, and neither am I."

As an afterthought, he added, "I'd call Peter."

Nick, momentarily placated, picked up his cell phone. Then his frown deepened. "He should have been back by now."

Neal looked over Nick's shoulder at the time. "Peter should have been too."

They exchanged wary glances as Nick found Monroe's speed dial.

xxx

"Don't answer it," Monroe moaned piteously as Peter reached for the ringing cell phone that he was decidedly ignoring, burying his face in his hands. He knew, because he knew Nick, that faced with the logic that there was nothing he could do, Nick would still think that there was. "He'll try to come get us."

"How?" Peter asked skeptically. Monroe shrugged.

"And if I don't answer it?" Peter asked.

"Well, then he'll probably still try," Monroe said. "With the added bonus of not actually knowing where we are."

"Right. Do me a favor, keep him away from Neal," Peter said as he answered Monroe's phone. "Nick?"

"Peter?" Monroe heard a gravelly voice on the other end ask. It wasn't Nick.

"Neal?" Peter said a moment later. His surprise was particularly short-lived, Monroe noted. "Why do you have Nick's phone?"

"Why do you have Monroe's?" Neal countered.

"Apparently we all felt like being neighborly," Peter said. Then after a brief glance at Monroe, he asked, "Is Nick with you?"

"We're both in Monroe's bed," Neal said. The hacking cough in the background seemed to explain why Neal had the phone. God did Nick sound terrible. Really, they both sounded terrible. Monroe frowned at the bottle of cough syrup leaning against his knee, trying to will it to them. "It's a long story."

"I'm not even going to ask," Peter said.

"I'm definitely going to ask," Monroe muttered, wondering dimly what had made him think that being essentially bedridden in a hotel room would make Nick less of a trouble magnet. He left Nick alone for two hours, and he had attracted a con-man, the hijinks of which could be fodder for a modern Scheherazade.

The diminishing sound of coughing came closer to the phone, followed by Nick's comforting, if not, perhaps, particularly Nick-like, voice. "Tell you all about it when you're back, but first, where are you?"

Monroe glanced up at Peter, sighed, and shrugged. As much as he hated to admit it, there wasn't much point in denying it. "Well, we're sort of near but not on the road, and we're sort of stuck in this not on the road scenario, due to the snow and ice situation."

"Monroe, I have a headache and a fever, you're really going to have to spell it out," Nick said.

"We skidded off the road, and now Peter's car is stuck," Monroe said.

"Okay. Did you call for help?" Nick asked.

"Nick, Peter's an FBI agent, what do you think?" Monroe asked, immediately regretting that he was taking his current frustration out on his sick...well, whatever Nick was. Nick didn't seem to really notice, though.

"Okay, good," Nick said. Then he and Neal both started asking them questions in rapid succession, apparently neither of them trusting that Monroe and Peter's respective scout and Quantico days, during which they had been taught survival skills, were sufficient preparation for this. Admittedly, those skills hadn't necessarily related to being stranded in a car during a snowstorm.

They confirmed that they had turned the car off to conserve power, turned the emergency lights on so anyone passing by could see them (and very preferably not drive into them), that they had blankets in the car, which were currently being put to use, and finally, that they had, despite their partners' immense skepticism about the matter, made sure ice wasn't blocking the tailpipe.

So really, aside from being rather cold, despite the blankets, having a very vague idea of where they were, having no idea when emergency personnel were going to be able to get to them, and having diminishing battery life on their cell phones, they were completely fine.

Nick and Neal clearly weren't, though. And Monroe knew that Peter was as desperate to get back to Neal as he was to get back to Nick. They both frowned over the phone, knowing that as much as they wanted to, the four of them couldn't keep this conversation going.

As Neal started coughing as terribly as Nick had been earlier, Monroe said, "You two need to get some more rest. So take care of each other until we get back, alright?"

"Don't spend your energy worrying about us," Peter added. "We can take care of ourselves and each other, if we need to."

And apparently, they were going to need to, Monroe thought dimly as the sound of a nearby tree branch snapping broke through the white noise of the ongoing storm.

A long, sharp icicle collided with the passenger side window, momentarily creating a thin, clear spiderweb of ice and glass. It dissolved as quickly as it had appeared, and Monroe found himself fighting against his impulse to howl and to woge as the glass and ice shattered painfully against his right arm.

He wasn't sure if he'd succeeded in the latter, but he certainly hadn't in the former.

"Monroe!" Nick shouted, or, at least, tried to shout - his voice was pretty much shot.

"It's just my arm, Nick," Monroe said through clenched teeth. "It's fine. Really, it's fine."

It was just his arm, but fine was perhaps overselling the circumstances. It was cut everywhere. He had no idea how much glass was in the cuts, and several of them were bleeding freely.

Then, worryingly for both him and Peter, they now had no real way to block the cold air from getting in the car.

"Monroe, can you move to the back seat without cutting yourself on more of the glass?" Peter asked. Monroe nodded. "It's important that you stay warm, so do it quickly."

He climbed out awkwardly, wincing against the wind and the snow as he held his injured arm against his chest. Before he had time to register that he was really going to need both arms to open the ice and snow covered door, Peter had run around to help him.

Then, after throwing a blanket over the open window, Peter climbed into the backseat, gestured for Monroe to move towards the driver's side, and picked the phone back up. He listened to what Monroe could only imagine were feverish, worried ramblings. "Nick, he's fine. His arm is a little worse for the wear, but it's nothing we can't deal with, okay? So take care of Neal for me, and I'll take care of him. Do we have deal?" Peter asked. "Good. Try and remember that if you two are there worrying over us, you're just going to make yourselves worse, alright?"

He hung up the phone, and his attention turned to Monroe.

"How are you doing? I'm not Nick, and I don't have the flu. Don't feel like you need to sugar coat it," Peter said.

"I can't really tell," Monroe said, staring at his arm disparagingly. He was very glad the sight of blood mixed with coat, shirt, and glass wouldn't make him faint. "I'm not sure if it's the shock or the cold, but I can't feel most of my arm."

Peter considered that and nodded."Well, we can't really do anything else, so let's focus on getting the glass out of it. I have a pair of tweezers in here somewhere. Don't try to take your coat off; I'll work around it."

Once Peter located the tweezers in the center console, he reached for Monroe's arm, "May I?"

Hesitantly, Monroe extended it towards him. He knew unless Peter was a Grimm or Wesen, he wouldn't be able to see him woge against the pain of this if he didn't want him to. And his arm really was pretty numb. But he was still a little wary about it.

XXX

"Monroe, are you still with me?" Peter asked. Despite the limited dim light being cast from his flashlight, he'd been doing his best to get the glass out of the other man's arm. At this point, he'd gotten the largest and most visible shards out.

Through all of it, mostly, Monroe hadn't said or done much other than wince and occasionally hiss against the pull of the tweezers.

Since he had been rambling non-stop for nearly five minutes after the car had gone off the road, Peter had a feeling this was a testament to how not with it he really was.

He was also shivering despite both of the blankets that Peter had thrown over him. He had Peter a little worried.

"Sort of," Monroe said. "I think."

As compelling as that was, Peter set the tweezers on his knee so he could look up at him. Monroe's eyelids were drooping heavily, and now that he was really looking, he saw a few small pieces of glass in Monroe's curls. He silently thanked the powers that be that the glass had, mostly, only hit his arm.

"Monroe, I need to look at your head. I want to make sure there isn't any more glass," Peter said. He had a feeling that without the warning, Monroe would flinch away. He didn't seem precisely keen on being taken care of by a relative stranger. So Peter was doing his best to stay in Monroe's comfort zone.

Wordlessly, Monroe carefully tilted his head forward, and Peter ran his fingers through his hair as gently as he could. As he did, fragmented pieces of glass fell to the floor of the car, but, thankfully, it seemed none of it had cut into his skin.

"I'm shatter glass free now, huh?" Monroe asked as Peter drew his hand back.

"Yeah, mostly, so now you just need to stay conscious," Peter said. "How's that going?"

"Um, well, perhaps not as well as it ought to be going," Monroe said.

Peter frowned at that. He wasn't actually sure Monroe needed to stay awake. He really didn't know what the protocol was here, but instinct told him to keep Monroe talking.

"You didn't tell me before, what brought you and Nick to Rhinebeck?" Peter asked. "It's an unusual vacation spot."

Peter felt a little guilty that this could be the start of an interrogation, but this was how he got people to open up. And opening up seemed like a good way to keep Monroe up.

"I'm not exactly sure you'd call it a vacation," Monroe said. "This town, it's where Nick's from. And he hasn't been back in years, and well, he wanted to visit his dad's grave. Not the most cheerful of trips, I grant you. But he didn't want to come alone."

"Were he and his father on bad terms?" Peter asked.

Monroe didn't answer right away, and Peter suspected he had gotten too close to doing his job when he shouldn't.

"I'm sorry. I just wasn't sure why he wouldn't have come back for so long otherwise," Peter said, trying to backtrack.

"It's alright," Monroe said. "Nick gets this way too. Well, not usually with me. But detective mode. It's definitely something. Anyway, no, Nick's dad died in a car accident when he was 12. His aunt pretty much raised him after that."

Peter wanted to ask about Nick's mom too, thought better of it, and picked what he thought would be a more innocuous subject. "Alright. Enough about Nick's past. I'll move towards the present. How did you and Nick meet?"

Monroe was apparently five levels of not prepared for this question because he all but started hyperventilating.

"Hey, breathe," Peter said, backing away slightly, hoping it would help. "You don't have to tell me. I thought maybe he brought you a watch or a clock to fix. I'm going to take a shot in the dark and assume that that's not the case."

Peter waited until Monroe's breathing seemed more even to add,"If it helps, the first time I met Neal, he was running a con on me."

Monroe laughed lightly. "Well, at least he didn't accuse you of kidnapping."

"That's how you met?" Peter asked raising his eyebrows. No wonder he didn't want to share.

"Yeah. I mean, water pretty well under the bridge now, I think," Monroe said. "But yeah, Nick is a jump-to-unfortunate-conclusions kind of guy. So, he profiled me as...as a loner, I guess."

It sounded like this was a conclusion that Monroe had just come to, and Peter felt that something significant was being left out of the story. So he reminded himself, so he wouldn't pry, that Monroe was not, at this moment in time, a criminal suspect.

Monroe, thankfully much more alert now, was staring wide-eyed and thoughtful at the thinning swirl of snow.

Without any prompting, he continued, "Though really, if he hadn't, maybe I never would have met him at all. So, you know what, I'm glad it happened. Besides, I'm not even close to the kind of guy Nick thought I was then. Not anymore. Not since Nick."

"He's really made an impact on you, huh?" Peter asked.

"God, he has no idea," Monroe said with a snort. "I know how much of a requisite I am to him. Hell, he can't do his job without me half the time. But I don't know if he has any clue that I needed him too. I didn't know I needed him. I mean, I could have lived life the way I was living it. I really could have. But, you know, it's...it's so much fuller now. And it's fuller because of him."

Unsure how he had gotten Monroe into the vulnerable position of what was bordering on a love confession, Peter said, "Well, you can tell him later; I'm sure he'd like to hear it."

He privately added much more than I would .

And thinking that he would otherwise be bound to ask how Monroe, a clockmaker, managed to routinely help Nick with his job, the sound of sirens blaring in the distance was welcome music to his ears.


End file.
